LETTERS FROM SOUTH AFRICA.
BY LADY BARKER.
D'URBAN, January 3, 1876.
I must certainly begin this letter by setting aside every other topic for the moment and telling you of our grand event, our national celebration, our historical New Year's Day. We have "turned the first sod" of our first inland railway, and, if I am correctly informed, at least a dozen sods more, but you must remember, if you please, that our navvies are Kafirs, and that they do not understand what Mr. Carlyle calls the beauty and dignity of labor in the least. It is all very well for you conceited dwellers in the Old and New Worlds to laugh at us for making such a fuss about a projected hundred miles of railway—you whose countries are made into dissected maps by the magic iron lines—but for poor us, who have to drag every pound of sugar and reel of sewing-cotton over some sixty miles of vile road between this and Maritzburg, such a line, if it be ever finished, will be a boon and a blessing indeed.
I think I can better make you understand how great a blessing if I describe my journeys up and down—journeys made, too, under exceptionally favorable circumstances. The first thing which had to be done, some three weeks before the day of our departure, was to pack and send down by wagon a couple of portmanteaus with our smart clothes. I may as well mention here that the cost of the transit came to fourteen shillings each way for three or four small, light packages, and that on each occasion we were separated from our possessions for a fortnight or more. The next step to be taken was to secure places in the daily post-cart, and it required as much mingled firmness and persuasion to do this as though it had reference to a political crisis. But then there were some hundreds of us Maritzburgians all wanting to be taken down to D'Urban within the space of a few days, and there was nothing to take us except the open post-cart, which occupied six hours on the journey, and an omnibus, which took ten hours, but afforded more shelter from possible rain and probable sun. Within the two vehicles some twenty people might, at a pinch, find places, and at least a hundred wanted to go every day of that last week of the old year. I don't know how the others managed: they must have got down somehow, for there they were in great force when the eventful day had arrived.
This first journey was prosperous, deceitfully prosperous, as though it would fain try to persuade us that after all there was a great deal to be said in favor of a mode of traveling which reminded one of the legends of the glories of the old coaching days. No dust—for there had been heavy rain a few days before—a perfect summer's day, hot enough in the sun, but not disagreeably hot as we bowled along, fast as four horses could go, in the face of a soft, balmy summer breeze. We were packed as tightly as we could fit—two of us on the coach-box, with the mail-bags under our feet and the driver's elbows in our ribs. The ordinary light dog-cart which daily runs between Maritzburg and D'Urban was exchanged for a sort of open break, strong indeed, but very heavy, one would fancy, for the poor horses, who had to scamper along up and down veldt and berg, over bog and spruit, with this lumbering conveyance at their heels. Not for long, though: every seven miles, or even less, we pulled up—sometimes at a tidy inn, where a long table would be set in the open verandah laden with eatables (for driving fast through the air sharpens even the sturdy colonial appetite), sometimes at a lonely shanty by the roadside, from whence a couple of Kafir lads emerged tugging at the bridles of the fresh horses. But I am bound to say that although each of these teams did a stage twice a day, although they were ill-favored and ill-groomed, their harness shabby beyond description, and their general appearance most forlorn, they were one and all in good condition and did their work in first-rate style. The wheelers were generally large, gaunt and most hideous animals, but the leaders often were ponies who, one could imagine, under happier circumstances might be handsome little horses enough, staunch and willing to the last degree. They knew their driver's cheery voice as well as possible, and answered to every cry and shout of encouragement he gave them as we scampered along. Of course, each horse had its name, and equally of course "Sir Garnet" was there in a team with "Lord Gifford" and "Lord Carnarvon" for leaders. Did we come to a steep hillside, up which any respectable English horse would certainly expect to walk in a leisurely, sober fashion, then our driver shook out his reins, blew a ringing blast on his bugle, and cried, "Walk along, Lord Gifford! think as you've another Victoriar Cross to get top o' this hill! Walk along, Lord Carnarvon! you ain't sitting in a cab'net council here, you know. Don't leave Sir Garnet do all the work, you know. Forward, my lucky lads! creep up it!" and by the time he had shrieked out this and a lot more patter, behold! we were at the top of the hill, and a fresh, lovely landscape was lying smiling in the sunshine below us. It was a beautiful country we passed through, but, except for a scattered homestead here and there by the roadside, not a sign of a human dwelling on all its green and fertile slopes. How the railway is to drag itself up and round all those thousand and one spurs running into each other, with no distinct valley or flat between, is best known to the engineers and surveyors, who have declared it practicable. To the non-professional eye it seems not only difficult, but impossible. But oh how it is wanted! All along the road shrill bugle-blasts warned the slow, trailing ox-wagons, with their naked "forelooper" at their head, to creep aside out of our way, I counted one hundred and twenty wagons that day on fifty miles of road. Now, if one considers that each of these wagons is drawn by a span of some thirty or forty oxen, one has some faint idea of how such a method of transport must waste and use up the material of the country. Something like ten thousand oxen toil over this one road summer and winter, and what wonder is it not only that merchandise costs more to fetch up from D'Urban to Maritzburg than it does to bring it out from England, but that beef is dear and bad! As transport pays better than farming, we hear on all sides of farms thrown out of cultivation, and as a necessary consequence milk, butter, and so forth are scarce and poor, and in the neighborhood of Maritzburg, at least, it is esteemed a favor to let you have either at exorbitant prices and of most inferior quality. When one looks round at these countless acres of splendid grazing-land, making a sort of natural park on either hand, it seems like a bad dream to know that we have constantly to use preserved milk and potted meat as being cheaper and easier to procure than fresh.
No one was in any mood, however, to discuss political economy that beautiful day, and we laughed and chatted, and ate a great many luncheons, chiefly of tea and peaches, all the way along. Our driver enlivened the route by pointing out various spots where frightful accidents had occurred to the post-cart on former occasions: "You see that big stone? Well, it war jest there that Langabilile and Colenso, they takes the bits in their teeth, those 'osses do, and they sets off their own pace and their own way. Jim Stanway, he puts his brake down hard and his foot upon the reins, but, Lord love you! them beasts would ha' pulled his arms and legs both off afore they'd give in. So they runs poor Jim's near wheel right up agin that bank and upsets the whole concern, as neat as needs be, over agin that bit o' bog. Anybody hurt? Well, yes: they was all what you might call shook. Mr. Bell, he had his arm broke, and a foreign chap from the diamond-fields, he gets killed outright, and Jim himself had his head cut open. It was a bad business, you bet, and rough upon Jim. Ja!"
All the driver's conversation is interlarded with "Ja," but he never says a worse word than that, and he drinks nothing but tea. As for a pipe, or a cigar even, when it is offered to him he screws up his queer face into a droll grimace and says, "No—thanks. I want all my nerves, I do, on this bit of road.—Walk along, Lady Barker: I'm ashamed of you, I am, hanging your head like that at a bit of a hill!" It was rather startling to hear this apostrophe all of a sudden, but as my namesake was a very hard-working little brown mare, I could only laugh and declare myself much flattered.
Here we are at last, amid the tropical vegetation which makes a green and tangled girdle around D'Urban for a dozen miles inland: yonder is the white and foaming line of breakers which marks where the strong current, sweeping down the east coast, brings along with it all the sand and silt it can collect, especially from the mouth of the Umgeni River close by, and so forms the dreaded bar, which divides the outer from the inner harbor. Beyond this crisp and sparkling line of heaving, tossing snow stretches the deep indigo-blue of the Indian Ocean, whilst over all wonderful sunset tints of opal and flame-color are hovering and changing with the changing, wind-driven clouds. Beneath our wheels are many inches of thick white sand, but the streets are gay and busy, with picturesque coolies in their bright cotton draperies and swiftly-passing Cape carts and vehicles of all sorts. We are in D'Urban indeed—D'Urban in unwonted holiday dress and on the tippest tiptoe of expectation and excitement. A Cape cart, with a Chinese coolie driver, and four horses apparently put in harness together for the first time, was waiting for us and our luggage at the post-office. We got into it, and straight-way began to plunge through the sandy streets once more, turning off the high-road and beginning almost immediately to climb with pain and difficulty the red sandy slopes of the Berea, a beautiful wooded upland dotted with villas. The road is terrible for man and beast, and we had to stop every few yards to breathe the horses. At last our destination is reached, through fields of sugar-cane and plantations of coffee, past luxuriant fruit trees, rustling, broad-leafed bananas and encroaching greenery of all sorts, to a clearing where a really handsome house stands, with hospitable, wide-open doors, awaiting us. Yes, a good big bath first, then a cup of tea, and now we are ready for a saunter in the twilight on the wide level terrace (called by the ugly Dutch name "stoop") which runs round three sides of the house. How green and fragrant and still it all is! Straight-way the glare of the long sunny day, the rattle and jolting of the post-cart, the toil through the sand, all slip away from mind and memory, and the tranquil delicious present, "with its-odors of rest and of love," slips in to soothe and calm our jaded senses. Certainly, it is hotter here than in Maritzburg—that assertion we are prepared to die in defence of—but we acknowledge that the heat at this hour is not oppressive, and the tropical luxuriance of leaf and flower all around is worth a few extra degrees of temperature. Of course, our talk is of to-morrow, and we look anxiously at the purpling clouds to the west.
"A fine day," says our host; and so it ought to be with five thousand people come from far and wide to see the sight. Why, that is more than a quarter of the entire white population of Natal! Bed and sleep become very attractive suggestions, though made indecently soon after dinner, and it is somewhere about ten o'clock when they are carried out, and, like Lord Houghton's famous "fair little girl," we
Know nothing more till again it is day.
A fine day, too, is this same New Year's Day of 1876—a glorious day—sunny of course, but with a delicious breeze stealing among the flowers and shrubs in capricious puffs, and snatching a differing scent from each heavy cluster of blossom it visits. By mid-day F—— has got himself into his gold-laced coat and has lined the inside of his cocked hat with plaintain-leaves.
He has also groaned much at the idea of substituting this futile head-gear for his hideous but convenient pith helmet. I too have donned my best gown, and am horrified to find how much a smart bonnet (the first time I have needed to wear one since I left England) sets off and brings out the shades of tan in a sun-browned face; and for a moment I too entertain the idea of retreating once more to the protecting depths of my old shady hat. But a strong conviction of the duty one owes to a "first sod," and the consoling reflection that, after all, everybody will be equally brown (a fallacy, by the way: the D'Urban beauties looked very blanched by this summer weather), supported me, and I followed F—— and his cocked hat into the waiting carriage.
No need to ask, "Where are we to go?" All roads lead to the first sod to-day. We are just a moment late: F—— has to get out of the carriage and plunge into the sand, madly rushing off to find and fall into his place in the procession, and we turn off to secure our seats in the grand stand. But before we take them I must go and look at the wheelbarrow and spade, and above all at the "first sod." For some weeks past it has been a favorite chaff with us Maritzburgians to offer to bring a nice fresh, lively sod down with us, but we were assured D'Urban could furnish one. Here it is exactly under the triumphal arch, looking very faded and depressed, with a little sunburned grass growing feebly on it, but still a genuine sod and no mistake. The wheelbarrow was really beautiful, made of native woods with their astounding names. All three specimens of the hardest and handsomest yellow woods were there, and they were described to me as, "stink-wood, breeze-wood and sneeze-wood." The rich yellow of the wood is veined by handsome dark streaks, with "1876" inlaid in large black figures in the centre. The spade was just a common spade, and could not by any possibility be called anything else. But there is no time to linger and laugh any longer beneath all these fluttering streamers and waving boughs, for here are the Natal Carbineers, a plucky little handful of light horse clad in blue and silver, who have marched, at their own charges, all the way down from Maritzburg to help keep the ground this fine New Year's Day. Next come a strong body of Kafir police, trudging along through the dust with odd shuffling gait, bended knees, bare legs, bodies leaning forward, and keeping step and time by means of a queer sort of barbaric hum and grunt. Policemen are no more necessary than my best bonnet: they are only there for the same reason—for the honor and glory of the thing. The crowd is kept in order by somebody here and there with a ribboned wand, for it is the most orderly and respectable crowd you ever saw. In fact, such a crowd would be an impossibility in England or any highly-civilized country. There are no dodging vagrants, no slatternly women, no squalid, starving babies. In fact, our civilization has not yet mounted to effervescence, so we have no dregs. Every white person on the ground was well clad, well fed, and apparently well-to-do. The "lower orders" were represented by a bright fringe of coolies and Kafirs, sleek, grinning and as fat as ortolans, especially the babies. Most of the Kafirs were dressed in snow-white knickerbockers and shirts bordered by gay bands of color, with fillets of scarlet ribbon tied round their heads, while as for the coolies, they shone out like a shifting bed of tulips, so bright were the women's chuddahs and the men's jackets. All looked smiling, healthy and happy, and the public enthusiasm rose to its height when to the sound of a vigorous band (it is early yet in the day, remember, O flute and trombone!) a perfect liliputian mob of toddling children came on the ground. These little people were all in their cleanest white frocks and prettiest hats: they clung to each other and to their garlands and staves of flowers until the tangled mob reminded one of a May-Day fete. Not that any English May Day of my acquaintance could produce such a lavish profusion of roses and buds and blossoms of every hue and tint, to say nothing of such a sun and sky. The children's corner was literally like a garden, and nothing could be prettier than the effect of their little voices shrilling up through the summer air, as, obedient to a lifted wand, they burst into the chorus of the national anthem when the governor and mayor drove up. Cheers from white throats; gruff, loud shouts all together of Bayete! (the royal salute) and Inkosi! ("chieftain") from black throats; yells, expressive of excitement and general good-fellowship, from throats of all colors. Then a moment's solemn pause, a hushed silence, bared heads, and the loud, clear tones of a very old pastor in the land were heard imploring the blessing of Almighty God on this our undertaking, Again the sweet childish trebles rose into the sunshine in a chanted Amen, and then there were salutes from cannon, feux-de-joie from carbines, and more shoutings, and all the cocked hats were to be seen bowing; and then one more tremendous burst of cheering told that the sod was cut and turned and trundled, and finally pitched out of the new barrow back again upon the dusty soil—all in the most artistic and satisfactory fashion. "There are the Kafir navvies: they are really going to work now." (This latter with great surprise, for a Kafir really working, now or ever, would indeed have been the raree-show of the day.) But this natural phenomenon was left to develop itself in solitude, for the crowd began to reassemble into processions, and generally to find its way under shelter from sun and dust. The five hundred children were heralded and marched off to the tune of one of their own pretty hymns to where unlimited buns and tea awaited them, and we elders betook ourselves to the grateful shade and coolness of the flower-decked new market-hall, open to-day for the first time, and turned by flags and ferns and lavish wealth of what in England are costliest hot-house flowers into a charming banqueting-hall. All these exquisite ferns and blossoms cost far less than the string and nails which fastened them against the walls, and their fresh fragrance and greenery struck gratefully on our sun-baked eyes as we found our way into the big room.
Nothing could be more creditable to a young colony than the way everything was arranged, for the difficulties in one's culinary path in Natal are hardly to be appreciated by English housekeepers. At one time there threatened to be almost a famine in D'Urban, for besides the pressure of all these extra mouths of visitors to feed, there was this enormous luncheon, with some five hundred hungry people to be provided for. It seems so strange that with every facility for rearing poultry all around it should be scarce and dear, and when brought to market as thin as possible. The same may be said of vegetables: they need no culture beyond being put in the ground, and yet unless you have a garden of your own it is very difficult to get anything like a proper supply. I heard nothing but wails from distracted housekeepers about the price and scarcity of food that week. However, the luncheon showed no sign of scarcity, and I was much amused at the substantial and homely character of the menu, which included cold baked sucking pig among its delicacies. A favorite specimen of the confectioner's art that day consisted of a sort of solid brick of plum pudding, with, for legend, "The First Sod" tastefully picked out in white almonds on its dark surface. But it was a capital luncheon, and so soon as the mayor had succeeded in impressing on the band that they were not expected to play all the time the speeches were being made, everything went on very well. Some of the speeches were short, but oh! far, far too many were long, terribly long, and the whole affair was not over before five o'clock. The only real want of the entertainment was ice. It seems so hard not to have it in a climate which can produce such burning days, for those tiresome cheap little ice-machines with crystals are of no use whatever. I got one which made ice (under pressure of much turning) in the ship, but it has never made any here, and my experience is that of everybody else. Why there should not be an ice-making or an ice-importing company no one knows, except that there is so little energy or enterprise here that everything is dawdly and uncomfortable because it seems too much trouble to take pains to supply wants. It is the same everywhere throughout the colony: sandy roads with plenty of excellent materials for hardening them close by; no fish to be bought because no one will take the trouble of going out to catch them. But I had better stop scribbling, for I am evidently getting tired after my long day of unwonted festivity. It is partly the oppression of my best bonnet, and partly the length of the speeches, which have wearied me out so thoroughly.
MARITZBURG, January 6.
Nothing could afford a greater contrast than our return journey. It was the other extreme of discomfort and misery, and must surely have been sent to make us appreciate and long for the completion of this very railway. We waited a day beyond that fixed for our return, in order to give the effects of a most terrific thunderstorm time to pass away, but it was succeeded by a perfect deluge of rain. Rain is not supposed to last long at this season of the year, but all I can say is that this rain did last. When the third day came and brought no sign of clearing up with it, and very little down to speak of, we agreed to delay no longer; besides which our places in the post-cart could not be again exchanged, as had previously been done, for the stream of returning visitors was setting strongly toward Maritzburg, and we might be detained for a week longer if we did not go at once. Accordingly, we presented ourselves at the D'Urban post-office a few minutes before noon and took our places in the post-cart. My seat was on the box, and as I flattered myself that I was well wrapped up, I did not feel at all alarmed at the prospect of a cold, wet drive. Who would believe that twenty-four hours ago one could hardly endure a white muslin dressing-gown? Who would believe that twenty-four hours ago a lace shawl was an oppressive wrap, and that the serious object of my envy and admiration all these hot days on the Berea has been a fat Abyssinian baby, as black as a coal, and the strongest and biggest child one ever saw. That sleek and grinning infant's toilette consisted of a string of blue beads round its neck, and in this cool and airy costume it used to pervade the house, walking about on all fours exactly like a monkey, for of course it could not stand. Yet, how cold that baby must be to-day! But if it is, its mother has probably tied it behind her in an old shawl, and it is nestling close to her fat broad back fast asleep.
But the baby is certainly a most unwarrantable digression, and we must return to our post-cart. The discouraging part of it was that the vehicle itself had been in all the storm and rain of yesterday. Of course no one had dreamed of washing or wiping it out in any fashion, so we had to sit upon wet cushions and put our feet into a pool of red mud and water. Now, if I must confess the truth, I, an old traveler, had done a very stupid thing. I had been lured by the deceitful beauty of the weather when we started into leaving behind me everything except the thinnest and coolest garments I possessed, and I therefore had to set out on this journey in the teeth of a cold wind and driving rain clad in a white gown. It is true, I had my beloved and most useful ulster, but it was a light waterproof one, and just about half enough in the way of warmth. Still, as I had another wrap, a big Scotch plaid, I should have got along very well if it had not been for the still greater stupidity of the only other female fellow-passenger, who calmly took her place in the open post-cart behind me in a brown holland gown, without scarf or wrap or anything whatever to shelter her from the weather, except a white calico sunshade. She was a Frenchwoman too, and looked so piteous and forlorn in her neat toilette, already drenched through, that of course I could do nothing less than lend her my Scotch shawl, and trust to the driver's friendly promises of empty corn-bags at some future stage. By the time the bags came—or rather by the time we got to the bags—I was indeed wet and cold. The ulster, did its best, and all that could be expected of it, but no garment manufactured in a London shop could possibly cope with such wild weather, tropical in the vehemence of its pouring rain, wintry in its cutting blasts. The wind seemed to blow from every quarter of the heavens at once, the rain came down in sheets, but I minded the mud more than either wind or rain: it was more demoralizing. On the box-seat I got my full share and more, but yet I was better off there than inside, where twelve people were squeezed into the places of eight. The horses' feet got balled with the stiff red clay exactly as though it had been snow, and from time to time as they galloped along, six fresh ones at every stage, I received a good lump of clay, as big and nearly as solid as a croquet-ball, full in my face. It was bitterly cold, and the night was closing in when we drove up to the door of the best hotel in Maritzburg, at long past eight instead of six o'clock. It was impossible to get out to our own place that night, so there was nothing for it but to stay where we were, and get what food and rest could be coaxed out of an indifferent bill of fare and a bed of stony hardness, to say nothing of the bites of numerous mosquitoes. The morning light revealed the melancholy state of my unhappy white gown in its full horror. All the rivers of Natal will never make it white again, I fear. Certainly there is much to be said in favor of railway-traveling, after all, especially in wet weather.
JANUARY 10.
Surely, I have been doing something else lately besides turning this first sod? Well, not much. You see, no one can undertake anything in the way of expeditions or excursions, or even sight-seeing, in summer, partly on account of the heat, and partly because of the thunderstorms. We have had a few very severe ones lately, but we hail them with joy on account of the cool clear atmosphere which succeeds to a display of electrical vehemence. We walked home from church a few evenings ago on a very wild and threatening night, and I never shall forget the weird beauty of the scene. We had started to go to church about six o'clock: the walk was only two miles, and the afternoon was calm and cloudless. The day had been oppressively hot, but there were no immediate signs of a storm. While we were in church, however, a fresh breeze sprang up and drove the clouds rapidly before it. The glare of the lightning made every corner of the church as bright as day, and the crash of the thunder shook the wooden roof over our heads. But there was no rain yet, and when we came out—in fear and trembling, I confess, as to how we were to get home—we could see that the violence of the storm had either passed over or not yet reached the valley in which Maritzburg nestles, and was expending itself somewhere else. So F—— decided that we might venture. As for vehicles to be hired in the streets, there are no such things, and by the time we could have persuaded one to turn out for us—a very doubtful contingency, and only to be procured at the cost of a sovereign or so—the full fury of the storm would probably be upon us. There was nothing for it, therefore, but to walk, and so we set out as soon as possible to climb our very steep hill. Instead of the soft, balmy twilight on which we had counted, the sky was of an inky blackness, but for all that we had light enough and to spare. I never saw such lightning. The flashes came literally every second, and lit up the whole heavens and earth with a blinding glare far brighter than any sunshine. So great was the contrast, and so much more intense the darkness after each flash of dazzling light, that we could only venture to walk on during the flashes, though one's instinct was rather to stand still, awestricken and mute. The thunder growled and cracked incessantly, but far away, toward the Inchanga Valley. If the wind had shifted ever so little and brought the storm back again, our plight would have been poor indeed; and with this dread upon us we trudged bravely on and breasted the hillside with what haste and courage we could. During the rare momentary intervals of darkness we could perceive that the whole place was ablaze with fireflies. Every blade of grass held a tiny sparkle of its own, but when the lightning shone out with its yellow and violet glare the modest light of the poor little fireflies seemed to be quite extinguished. As for the frogs, the clamorous noise they kept up sounded absolutely deafening, and so did the shrill, incessant cry of the cicalas. We reached home safely and before the rain fell, but found all our servants in the verandah in the last stage of dismay and uncertainty what to do for the best. They had collected waterproofs, umbrellas and lanterns; but as it was not actually raining yet, and we certainly did not require light on our path—for they said that each flash showed them our climbing, trudging figures as plainly as possible—it was difficult to know what to do, especially as the Kafirs have, very naturally, an intense horror and dislike to going out in a thunderstorm. This storm was not really overhead at all, and scarcely deserves mention except as the precursor of a severe one of which our valley got the full benefit. It was quite curious to see the numbers of dead butterflies on the garden-paths after that second storm. Their beautiful plumage was not dimmed or smirched nor their wings broken: they would have been in perfect order for a naturalist's collection; yet they were quite dead and stiff. The natives declare it is the lightning which kills them thus.
My own private dread—to return to that walk home for a moment—was of stepping on a snake, as there are a great many about, and one especial variety, a small poisonous brown adder, is of so torpid and lazy a nature that it will not glide out of your way, as other snakes do, but lets you tread on it and then bites you. It is very marvelous, considering how many snakes there are, that one hears of so few bad accidents. G—— is always poking about in likely places for them, as his supreme ambition is to see one. I fully expect a catastrophe some day, and keep stores of ammonia and brandy handy. Never was such a fearless little monkey. He is always scampering about on his old Basuto pony, and of course tumbles off now and then; but he does not mind it in the least. When he is not trying to break his neck in this fashion he is down by himself at the river fishing, or he is climbing trees, or down a well which is being dug here, or in some piece of mischief or other. The sun and the fruit are my bêtes noires, but neither seems to hurt him, though I really don't believe that any other child in the world has ever eaten so many apricots at one time as he has been doing lately. This temptation has just been removed, however, for during our short absence at D'Urban every fruit tree has been stripped to the bark—every peach and plum, every apple and apricot, clean gone. Of course, no one has done it, but it is very provoking all the same, for it used to be so nice to take the baby out very early, and pick up the fallen apricots for breakfast. The peaches are nearly all pale and rather tasteless, but the apricots are excellent in flavor, of a large size and in extraordinary abundance. There was also a large and promising crop of apples, but they have all been taken in their unripe state. As a rule, the Kafirs are scrupulously honest, and we left plate and jewelry in the house under Charlie's care whilst we were away, without the least risk, for such things they would never touch; but fruit or mealies they cannot be brought to regard as personal property, and they gather the former and waste the latter without scruple. It is a great objection to the imported coolies, who make very clean and capital servants, that they have inveterate habits of pilfering and are hopelessly dishonest about trifles. For this reason they are sure to get on badly with Kafir fellow-servants, who are generally quite above any temptation of that kind.
JANUARY 14.
A few days ago we took G—— to see the annual swimming sports in the small river which runs through the park. It was a beautiful afternoon, for a wonder, with no lowering thunder-clouds over the hills, so the banks of the river were thronged for half a mile and more with spectators. It made a very pretty picture, the large willow trees drooping into the water on either shore, the gay concourse of people, the bright patch of color made by the red coats of the band of the regiment stationed across the stream, the tents for the competitors to change in, the dark wondering faces of Kafirs and coolies, who cannot comprehend why white people should take so much trouble and run so much risk to amuse themselves. We certainly must appear to them to be possessed by a restless demon of energy, both in our work and our play, and never more so than on this hot afternoon, when, amid much shouting and laughing, the various water-races came off. The steeplechase amused us a great deal, where the competitors had to swim over and under various barriers across the river; and so did the race for very little boys, which was a full and excellent one. The monkeys took to the water as naturally as fishes, and evidently enjoyed the fun more than any one. Indeed, the difficulty was to get them out of the water and into the tents to change their swimming costume after the race was over. But the most interesting event was one meant to teach volunteers how to swim rivers in case of field service, and the palm lay between the Natal Carbineers and a smart body of mounted police. At a given signal they all plunged on horseback into the muddy water, and from a very difficult part of the bank too, and swam, fully accoutred and carrying their carbines, across the river. It was very interesting to watch how clever the horses were, and how some of their riders slipped off their backs the moment they had fairly entered the stream and swam side by side with their steeds until the opposite bank was reached; and then how the horses paused to allow their dripping masters to mount again—no easy task in heavy boots and saturated clothes, with a carbine in the left hand which had to be kept dry at all risks and hazards. When I asked little G—— which part he liked best, he answered without hesitation, "The assidents" (angliçè, accidents), and I am not sure that he was not right; for, as no one was hurt, the crowd mightily enjoyed seeing some stalwart citizen in his best clothes suddenly topple from his place of vantage on the deceitfully secure-looking but rotten branch of a tree and take an involuntary bath in his own despite. When that citizen further chanced to be clad in a suit of bright-colored velveteen the effect was much enhanced. It is my private opinion that G—— was longing to distinguish himself in a similar fashion, for I constantly saw him "lying out" on most frail branches, but try as he might, he could not accomplish a tumble.
JANUARY 17.
I have had an opportunity lately of attending a Kafir lit de justice, and I can only say that if we civilized people managed our legal difficulties in the same way it would be an uncommonly good thing for everybody except the lawyers. Cows are at the bottom of nearly all the native disputes, and the Kafirs always take their grievance soberly to the nearest magistrate, who arbitrates to the best of his ability between the disputants. They are generally satisfied with his award, but if the case is an intricate one, or they consider that the question is not really solved, then they have the right of appeal, and it is this court of appeal which I have been attending lately. It is held in the newly-built office of the minister for native affairs—the prettiest and most respectable-looking public office which I have seen in Maritzburg, by the way. Before the erection of this modest but comfortable building the court used to be held out in the open air under the shade of some large trees—a more picturesque method of doing business, certainly, but subject to inconveniences on account of the weather. It is altogether the most primitive and patriarchal style of business one ever saw, but all the more delightful on that account.
It is inexpressibly touching to see with one's own eyes the wonderfully deep personal devotion and affection of the Kafirs for the kindly English gentleman who for thirty years and more has been their real ruler and their wise and judicious friend. Not a friend to pamper their vices and give way to their great fault of idleness, but a true friend to protect their interests, and yet to labor incessantly for their social advancement and for their admission into the great field of civilized workers. The Kafirs know little and care less for all the imposing and elaborate machinery of British rule; the queen on her throne is but a fair and distant dream-woman to them; Sir Garnet himself, that great inkosi, was as nobody in their eyes compared to their own chieftain, their king of hearts, the one white man to whom of their own free will and accord they give the royal salute whenever they see him. I have stood in magnificent halls and seen king and kaiser pass through crowds of bowing courtiers, but I never saw anything which impressed me so strongly as the simultaneous springing to the feet, the loud shout of Bayete! given with the right hand upraised (a higher form of salutation than Inkosi! and only accorded to Kafir royalty), the look, of love and rapture and satisfied expectation in all those keen black faces, as the minister, quite unattended, without pomp or circumstance of any sort or kind, quietly walked into the large room and sat himself down at his desk with some papers before him. There was no clerk, no official of any sort: no one stood between the people and the fountain of justice. The extraordinary simplicity of the trial which commenced was only to be equaled by the decorum and dignity with which it was conducted. First of all, everybody sat down upon the floor, the plaintiff and defendant amicably side by side opposite to the minister's desk, and the other natives, about a hundred in number, squatted in various groups. Then, as there was evidently a slight feeling of surprise at my sitting myself down in the only other chair—they probably considered me a new—fashioned clerk—the minister explained that I was the wife of another inkosi, and that I wanted to see and hear how Kafirmen stated their case when anything went wrong with their affairs. This explanation was perfectly satisfactory to all parties, and they regarded me no more, but immediately set to work on the subject in hand. A sort of prècis of each case had been previously prepared from the magistrate's report for Mr. S——'s information by his clerk, and these documents greatly helped me to understand what was going on. No language can be more beautiful to listen to than either the Kafir or Zulu tongue: it is soft and liquid as Italian, with just the same gentle accentuation on the penultimate and antepenultimate syllables. The clicks which are made with the tongue every now and then, and are part of the language, give it a very quaint sound, and the proper names are excessively harmonious.
In the first cause which was taken the plaintiff, as I said before, was not quite satisfied with the decision of his own local magistrate, and had therefore come here to restate his case. The story was slightly complicated by the plaintiff having two distinct names by which he had been known at different times of his life. "Tevula," he averred, was the name of his boyhood, and the other, "Mazumba," the name of his manhood. The natives have an unconquerable aversion to giving their real names, and will offer half a dozen different aliases, making it very difficult to trace them if they are "wanted," and still more difficult to get at the rights of any story they may have to tell. However, if they are ever frank and open to anybody, it is to their own minister, who speaks their language as well as they do themselves, and who fully understands their mode of reasoning and their habits of mind.
Tevula told his story extremely well, I must say—quietly, but earnestly, and with, the most perfectly respectful though manly bearing. He sometimes used graceful and natural gesticulation, but not a bit more than was needed to give emphasis to his oratory. He was a strongly-built, tall man, about thirty-five years of age, dressed in a soldier's great-coat—for it was a damp and drizzling day—had bare legs and feet, and wore nothing on his head except the curious ring into which the men weave their hair. So soon as a youth is considered old enough to assume the duties and responsibilities of manhood he begins to weave his short crisp hair over a ring of grass which exactly fits the head, keeping the woolly hair in its place by means of wax. In time the hair grows perfectly smooth and shining and regular over this firm foundation, and the effect is as though it were a ring of jet or polished ebony worn round the brows. Different tribes slightly vary the size and form of the ring; and in this case it was easy to see that the defendant belonged to a different tribe, for his ring was half the size, and worn at the summit of a cone of combed-back hair which was as thick and close as a cap, and indeed looked very like a grizzled fez. Anybody in court may ask any questions he pleases, and in fact what we should call "cross-examine" a witness, but no one did so whilst I was present. Every one listened attentively, giving a grunt of interest whenever Tevula made a point; and this manifestation and sympathy always seemed to gratify him immensely. But it was plain that, whatever might be the decision of the minister, who listened closely to every word, asking now and then a short question—which evidently hit some logical nail right on the head—they would abide by it, and be satisfied that it was the fairest and most equitable solution of the subject.
Here is a résumé of the first case, and it is a fair sample of the intricacies of a Kafir lawsuit: Our friend Tevula possesses an aged relative, a certain aunt, called Mamusa, who at the present time appears to be in her dotage, and consequently her evidence is of very little value. But once upon a time—long, long ago—Mamusa was young and generous: Mamusa had cows, and she gave or lent—there was the difficulty—a couple of heifers to the defendant, whose name I can't possibly spell on account of the clicks. Nobody denies that of her own free will these heifers had been bestowed by Mamusa on the withered-looking little old man squatting opposite, but the question is, Were they a loan or a gift? For many years nothing was done about these heifers, but one fine day Tevula gets wind of the story, is immediately seized with a fit of affection for his aged relative, and takes her to live in his kraal, proclaiming himself her protector and heir. So far so good: all this was in accordance with Kafir custom, and the narration of this part of the story was received with grunts of asseveration and approval by the audience. Indeed, Kafirs are as a rule to be depended upon, and their minds, though full of odd prejudices and quirks, have a natural bias toward truth. Two or three years ago Tevula began by claiming, as heir-at-law, though the old woman still lives, twenty cows from the defendant as the increase of these heifers: now he demands between thirty and forty. When asked why he only claimed twenty, as nobody denies that the produce of the heifers has increased to double that number, he says naively, but without hesitation, that there is a fee to be paid of a shilling a head on such a claim if established, and that he only had twenty shillings in the world; so, as he remarked with a knowing twinkle in his eye, "What was the use of my claiming more cows than I had money to pay the fee for?" But times have improved with Tevula since then, and he is now in a position to claim the poor defendant's whole herd, though he generously says he will not insist on his refunding those cows which do not resemble the original heifers, and are not, as they were, dun and red and white. This sounded magnanimous, and met with grunts of approval until the blear-eyed defendant remarked, hopelessly, "They are all of those colors," which changed the sympathies of the audience once more. Tevula saw this at a glance, and hastened to improve his position by narrating an anecdote. No words of mine could reproduce the dramatic talent that man displayed in his narration. I did not understand a syllable of his language, and yet I could gather from his gestures, his intonation, and above all from the expression of his hearers' faces, the sort of story he was telling them. After he had finished, Mr. S—— turned to me and briefly translated the episode with which Tevula had sought to rivet the attention and sympathy of the court. Tevula's tale, much condensed, was this: Years ago, when his attention had first been directed to the matter, he went with the defendant out on the veldt to look at the herd. No sooner did the cattle see them approaching than a beautiful little dun-colored heifer, the exact counterpart of her grandmother (Mamusa's cow), left the others and ran up to him, Tevula, lowing and rubbing her head against his shoulder, and following him all about like a dog. In vain did her reputed owner try to drive her away: she persisted in following Tevula all the way back to his kraal, right up to the entrance of his hut. "I was her master, and the inkomokazi knew it," cried Tevula triumphantly, looking round at the defendant with a knowing nod, as much as to say, "Beat that, if you can!" Not knowing what answer to make, the defendant took his snuff-box out of his left ear and solaced himself with three or four huge pinches. I started the hypothesis that Mamusa might once have had a tendresse for the old gentleman, and might have bestowed these cows upon him as a love-gift; but this idea was scouted, even by the defendant, who said gravely, "Kafir women don't buy lovers or husbands: we buy the wife we want." A Kafir girl is exceedingly proud of being bought, and the more she costs the prouder she is. She pities English women, whose bride-grooms expect to receive money instead of paying it, and considers a dowry as a most humiliating arrangement.
I wish I could tell you how Mamusa's cows have finally been disposed of, but, although it has occupied three days, the case is by no means over yet. I envy and admire Mr. S——'s untiring patience and unfailing good-temper, but it is just these qualities which make his Kafir subjects (for they really consider him as their ruler) so certain that their affairs will not be neglected or their interests suffer in his hands.
Whilst I was listening to Tevula's oratory my eyes and my mind sometimes wandered to the eager and silent audience, and I amused myself by studying their strange head-dresses. In most instances the men wore their hair in the woven rings to which I have alluded, but there were several young men present who indulged in purely fancy head-dresses. One stalwart youth had got hold of the round cardboard lid of a collar-box, to which he had affixed two bits of string, and tied it firmly but jauntily on one side of his head. Another lad had invented a most extraordinary decoration for his wool-covered pate, and one which it is exceedingly difficult to describe in delicate language. He had procured the intestines of some small animal, a lamb or a kid, and had cleaned and scraped them and tied them tightly, at intervals of an inch or two, with string. This series of small clear bladders he had then inflated, and arranged them in a sort of bouquet on the top of his head, skewering tufts of his crisp hair between, so that the effect resembled a bunch of bubbles, if there could be such a thing. Another very favorite adornment for the head consisted of a strip of gay cloth or ribbon, or of even a few bright threads, bound tightly like a fillet across the brows and confining a tuft of feathers over one ear; but I suspect all these fanciful arrangements were only worn by the gilded youth of a lower class, because I noticed that the chieftains and indunas, or headmen of the villages, never wore such frivolities. They wore indeed numerous slender rings of brass or silver wire on their straight, shapely legs, and also necklaces of lions' or tigers' claws and teeth round their throats, but these were trophies of the chase as well as personal ornaments.
THE LIFE OF GEORGE TICKNOR.[5]
It is a long time since a more interesting biography has been published than this of Mr. Ticknor. No American book of the same kind can be compared with it, and very few have appeared in England that give the reader as varied glimpses of society and as many details in regard to interesting people as may be found in these two entertaining volumes. Its fullness in this respect is what makes the charm of the book. Mr. Ticknor's life was a long one: from his youth he saw a great deal of the best society both of this country and of Europe, and he always had the custom of recording the impressions made upon him by the people he met. Hence this Life, which is for the most part made up of extracts from his letters and journals, is almost an autobiography, but an autobiography, one might almost say, without a hero, in which the writer keeps himself in the background and gives his main attention to other people. The editors have, however, given a full account of those parts of his life of which his own record is but brief.
He was born in Boston in 1791. His father, to judge from his letters, which are full of sensible advice, was a man of more than common ability, and he very carefully trained his son to put his talents to their best use. He had no stubborn material for his hands, for even in his youth Mr. Ticknor showed many of those traits which most clearly marked him in after life; among others, an intelligent, unimaginative, but also unmalicious observation of his kind for his relaxation, and for his work in life warm devotion to the study of letters. How scanty were the opportunities in this way at that period may be seen from his difficulties in getting any knowledge of German after his graduation from Dartmouth College, and when he had just given up his brief practice of the law. His teacher was an Alsatian, who knew his own pronunciation was bad; he was able to borrow a grammar from Mr. Everett, but he had to send to New Hampshire for a dictionary; and the only book he had to read was a copy of Werther belonging to John Quincy Adams, then in Europe, which he managed to borrow from the gentleman who had Mr. Adams's books under his care at the Athenæeum. This was in 1814, and already he had made up his mind to go to Germany and profit by the advantages offered by the universities of that country. With regard to the education he had already acquired, it is evident that he had learned more by private study than by following the courses of the college which had given him a degree. But before visiting other countries he determined to make himself familiar with his own, and for that purpose he made a journey to Washington and Virginia, seeing on his way, at New York, one of the earliest ships of war moved by steam, and in Philadelphia meeting John Randolph, whom he describes carefully in one of his letters to his father. At Washington he dined with President Madison, who was in considerable anxiety at the time (January 21, 1815) about the fate of New Orleans. He gives a dreary picture of the state festivities. The President, he says, "sometimes laughed, and I was glad to hear it, but his face was always grave. He talked of religious sects and parties, and was curious to know how the cause of liberal Christianity stood with us, and if the Athanasian creed was well received by our Episcopalians.... He talked of education and its prospects, of the progress of improvement among us, and once or twice he gave it a political aspect, though with great caution." In Virginia he visited Thomas Jefferson at Monticello, and this eminent man seems to have taken a great fancy to his young visitor, who gave his father a full account of his host and his ways. The details are too long to quote, but those who turn to the book will find that Mr. Ticknor began early to observe people, and that, although his descriptions, even in his youth, show a lack of imagination, they are yet made lifelike by his patient, unwearying elaboration of details. How full, for instance, is his account of Lord Jeffrey, written to one of his friends in 1814. Such letters have gone out of fashion now, when it is more frequent to sum up the characters of our visitors in epigrams than in long essays, as Mr. Ticknor has here done. This first star, who in comparison with many of Mr. Ticknor's later acquaintances was one of very modest magnitude, made his unexpected, comet-like appearance in Boston on his way to New York to marry an American woman. It is easy to believe what Mr. Ticknor says in his long account of him, that "while he flatters by his civility those who are little accustomed to attention from his superiors, he disappoints the reasonable expectations of those who have received the homage of all around them until it has become a part of their just expectations and claims."
In April, 1815, Mr. Ticknor set sail for England in company with his friend Edward Everett, and at the end of four weeks they arrived at Liverpool, just in time to hear of Napoleon's escape from Elba. There was at least one man in England who was pleased with that turn of fate, and that was Dr. Parr, whom Mr. Ticknor stopped to see on his way to London, and who told his young guest, "I should not think I had done my duty if I went to bed any night without praying for the success of Napoleon Bonaparte." Lord Byron, it should be added, on hearing the news of Waterloo, said, "I am d——d sorry for it.... I didn't know but I might live to see Lord Castlereagh's head on a pole. But I suppose I sha'n't now." Of this last-named admirer of Bonaparte, Mr. Ticknor saw a good deal during his stay in England. Byron was then a newly-married man, and on better terms with the world at large than he was at other times of his life. His American visitor recorded that he "found his manners affable and gentle, the tones of his voice low and conciliating, his conversation gay, pleasant and interesting in an uncommon degree."
Of the older men, he saw Dr. Rees, editor of the Encyclopædia, who had dined with Dr. Johnson and John Wilkes at Dilly's—not at the first dinner probably, for Boswell gives a list of the guests which does not include his name, but doubtless at the second, in 1781. Dr. Rees said that Wilkes won his way to Johnson's heart not, as Boswell reports, by his wit, but by the grossest flattery; and he added that Johnson always courted Boswell more than any one else, that he might be exhibited to posterity in a favorable light. A mere list of the names of the people he saw during this short stay in England will show how full of interest this part of his diary is. Campbell, Gifford, West, Sir Humphry Davy he saw most frequently, but no one so often as he did Byron. His penchant for "lions" always led him to prefer the lordliest among them.
It was a great change from the excitement and succession of novelties of London to the monotonous routine of Göttingen, where he arrived, after a journey of about five weeks, early in August, 1815. Göttingen at that time was the seat of the leading German university. It has never been full of distracting temptations: indeed, it is a town which seems to have been so arranged that the student should find in study alone relief from its manifold discomforts. The advantages it possessed were very great, and they were fully appreciated by the young American, who came from what in comparison was almost an intellectual wilderness to the rich stores of learning this university contained. It was at this time that he fairly began serious literary study and laid the foundation of his extensive knowledge of books. In one of his vacations he made a little tour in Germany, visiting Goethe, who made a characteristic speech about Byron's recent separation from his wife—namely, that in its circumstances and the mystery involving it it was so poetical that if Byron had invented it he could hardly have found a more fortunate subject for his genius.
After another winter in Göttingen he set out for Paris, which city he reached early in April, 1817. One of the first things he did was to go to the theatre, where he saw Talma and Mademoiselle Mars play together. But stronger tastes drew him more frequently into the best society that capital afforded him. One of the persons he was most anxious to meet was Madame de Staël, but although he presented his letters, her illness prevented her seeing him for some time, and her daughter, the Duchesse de Broglie, received him in her mother's stead. It was there that he met Humboldt, of whom he has recorded that he "sleeps only when he is weary and has leisure, and if he wakes at midnight he rises and begins his work as he would in the morning. He eats when he is hungry, and if he is invited to dine at six o'clock, this does not prevent him from going at five to a restaurant, because he considers a great dinner only as a party of pleasure and amusement. But all the rest of the time, when he is not in society, he locks his door and gives himself up to study, rarely receiving visits but those which have been announced the day previous, and never, I believe, refusing these." These habits are not commonly supposed to promote longevity. Before he left Paris Madame de Staël was able to see him, and with her he had an interesting conversation in which she said of America, "Vous êtes l'avant garde du genre humain, vous êtes l'avenir du monde," and made two or three brilliant speeches, at which he noticed her glow of animation. At the same place he also met Chateaubriand and Madame Récamier, between whom he sat at dinner. The romantic reader will be disappointed with his meagre statements here, which hardly bring these two people more distinctly before us than are Solomon and the queen of Sheba. We read that Madame Récamier's figure was fine, her mild eyes full of expression, and her arm and hand beautiful, her complexion fair, her expression cheerful and her conversation vivacious; of Chateaubriand, that he was a short man with a dark complexion, black hair and eyes, and a marked countenance; but exacter details of their characteristics or mutual relations are wholly wanting. While it is to be remembered that we who read Mr. Ticknor's diary and letters have also read a great many other letters that have given us much more knowledge about Madame Récamier than her companion at that dinner could have had, it is yet fair to say that in general the book contains no traces of acute observation or quick social sensibility, but is rather marked by the faithfulness of his report of the more obvious incidents that occurred when he met these interesting people. This does not diminish the value of the book: it should only prepare the reader to find the anecdotes constituting the really important part of it, with but little sign of any study of character, and of little sympathetic insight into the feelings of others.
He remained in Paris until September, working hard at the languages and literatures of France and Italy, and neglecting no opportunity to improve himself. At that date he started for Geneva on his way to Italy, crossing the Alps by the Simplon. At Venice he again saw Byron, who was busy, or professed to be, with a plan of visiting this country. Thence he made his way south to Rome and Naples, spending most of the winter in the former city among very interesting people, such as Bunsen, Niebuhr and Madame de Humboldt. In the spring of 1818 he went to Spain, and it is interesting to notice how much more vivacious his journal becomes with his entrance into that country. It seems to have been with real enjoyment that he changed the ease of his earlier journeyings for the hardships of traveling in this comfortless land; and although the inns were miserable, the fare uncertain and meagre at the best, and there were many other afflictions to vex the tourist, he evidently enjoyed this expedition to the full. On his way from Barcelona to Madrid he had for companions a painter of repute and two officers, and to these he used to read aloud Don Quixote, and, he says, "I assure you this was a pleasure to me such as I have seldom enjoyed, to witness the effect this extraordinary book produces on the people from whose very blood and character it is drawn.... All of them used to beg me to read it to them every time we got into our cart—like children for toys and sugar-plums." In Madrid he studied carefully the language and literature, his tastes and opportunities leading him to lay the solid foundation of what was to be the main work of his life. The society that he met here was mainly that of the foreign diplomatists, but, agreeable as it was, it did not distract him from his studies or from his observation of the people among whom he was placed. In a letter to this country he said, "What seems mere fiction and romance in other countries is matter of observation here, and in all that relates to manners Cervantes and Le Sage are historians; for when you have crossed the Pyrenees you have not only passed from one country and climate to another, but you have gone back a couple of centuries in your chronology, and find the people still in that kind of poetical existence which we have not only long since lost, but which we have long since ceased to credit on the reports of our ancestors."
Although it would be interesting to linger over the passages dealing with Spain, it is perhaps better to turn to his account of leaving it, which he did under the most singular circumstances—namely, as one of a band of contrabandistas. Not that he wore a mask and filled his purse by robbing unoffending travelers; instead, he joined this party of accomplished smugglers, who used to carry on the business of smuggling dollars from Seville to Lisbon and bring back English goods in the same way. For eight days he was in their company, and he says, "I have seldom passed eight more interesting days, for by the very novelty and strangeness of everything—sleeping out every night but one, and then in the house of the chief of our band; dining under trees at noon; living on a footing of perfect equality and good-fellowship with people who are liable every day to be shot or hanged by the laws of their country; indeed, leading for a week as much of a vagabond life as if I were an Arab or a Mameluke,—I came soon to have some of the gay recklessness that marked the character of my companions." This certainly would be a curious episode in the life of any law-abiding citizen, and in Mr. Ticknor's case it was peculiarly astonishing, for his life, this week excepted, could certainly never be called, with any show of justice, "vagabond."
Before returning to America he revisited London and Paris, in this last-named city seeing Talleyrand, of whom an interesting anecdote is recorded. In London he met Sydney Smith, Brougham, Frere; in Scotland, where he made a short tour, he visited Sir Walter Scott at Abbotsford; on his way back to London he visited Southey and Wordsworth; and once again in that city he saw Hazlitt, living in Milton's house, and Godwin, who, he said, "is as far removed from everything feverish and exciting as if his head had never been filled with anything but geometry,... When I looked at [him], and saw with what cool obstinacy he adhered to everything he had once assumed, and what a cold selfishness lay at the bottom of his character, I felt a satisfaction in the thought that he had a wife who must sometimes give a start to his blood and a stir to his nervous system." The feeling which betrays itself in this passage makes a still bolder and more amusing exhibit in one that follows: "The true way to see these people was to meet them all together, as I did once at dinner at Godwin's, and once at a convocation or 'Saturday Night Club' at Hunt's, when they felt themselves bound to show off and produce an effect; for there Lamb's gentle humor, Hunt's passion and Curran's volubility, Hazlitt's sharpness and point and Godwin's great head full of cold brains, all coming into contact and agreeing in nothing but their common hatred of everything that has been more successful than their own works, made one of the most curious and amusing olla podridas I ever met. The contrast between these persons ... and the class I was at the same time in the habit of meeting at Sir Joseph Banks's on Sunday evening, at Gifford's, at Murray's Literary Exchange, and especially at Lord Holland's, was striking enough." In regard to the last statement we can feel no doubt, nor is it surprising that Mr. Ticknor found the society of Gifford and his friends more congenial than that of "persons" like Lamb and Hunt.
He reached home June 6, 1819, after an absence of four years, during which time he had seen many "cities and manners," had accomplished himself in the modern languages and literatures, and become well fitted for the position which was awaiting him—that of professor of the French and Spanish languages and of the belles-lettres at Harvard College. These chairs were held by Mr. Ticknor until 1835, during the most active years of his mature life, and the record of what he did is not without importance in the history of education in this country. He had himself profited by the liberal system of the German universities, and he was naturally anxious to introduce such changes into the rather narrow curriculum of Harvard College as should give its students real zeal in their work and greater opportunities for improvement. At the beginning he found himself much hampered by old traditions and a general lack of sympathy with new methods; but he devoted himself earnestly to the task of introducing a course of instruction which should take the place of the dull routine of recitation. To accomplish this he set the example of giving a series of lectures on the literatures and literary histories of France and Spain, and he struggled hard to drive away the old routine from the rest of the college. He wrote a pamphlet containing most urgent and powerful arguments in defence of these amendments, which he proved to be possible by the example of his own success; but he was opposed by the most stubborn conservatism, and his efforts remained almost without apparent result. What he wanted was the abolition of the system of classes; the division of the college into departments; the election of studies by the students; the separation of the students into divisions according to their proficiency; and the opening of the college to those who cared to follow only certain courses without applying for a degree. The first of these changes he forebore to press, but all the others he urged most warmly. He was so far successful that the experiment was tried, but it was considered impracticable for the classes to be divided into sections, and by a vote of the faculty it was determined that the law requiring such division should be repealed: permission was given Mr. Ticknor, however, to continue in the new method if he cared so to do. Naturally, he persisted in his plan, and in his own department he was perfectly successful. When he left the college, although he had not accomplished all he had hoped when he accepted his professorship, he was able to look back upon an honorable and gratifying record so far as the management of his own department was concerned.
After resigning his position in Cambridge he again went abroad in 1835, accompanied by his wife and family. It would take many pages to give the reader an exact account, in however brief a form, of all the interest of this journey. A few notes taken almost at random must suffice. Of Southey, Mr. Ticknor notes: "His conversation was very various, sometimes quite remarkable, but never rich or copious like Wordsworth's, and never humorous or witty. It was rather abundant in matters of fact, and often in that way quite striking and effective." The first winter he spent in Dresden, meeting Tieck frequently, and enjoying the agreeable and highly-cultivated society of the court. The next summer, during a visit to Vienna, he had some interesting conversations with Prince Metternich, which are given in full. The winter of 1836-37 he passed in Rome, finding there Bunsen and Thorwaldsen, whom he had seen on his first visit. The next winter found him in Paris, where he saw Thierry, Lamartine, Thiers, Mignet, Guizot and others. Of Lamartine he says: "Only two things struck me—his complete ignorance of the present English literature, and the strong expression of his poetical faith that the recent improvements in material life, like steam and railroads, have their poetical sides, and will be used for poetical purposes with success." In the spring he crossed to England, where he roamed from one interesting spot to another, seeing every one of whom one cares to hear, and putting down in his journal faithful accounts of all that he saw and heard.
He returned to this country in June, 1838, and began at once to occupy himself busily with the preparation of his History of Spanish Literature. After this book had been published he began to busy himself with a very important scheme—namely, preparing the Public Library of his native city. As soon as Mr. Bates had made his generous gift, which secured the establishment of the library, Mr. Ticknor, with the aid of experts in the different professions, prepared a list of forty thousand books which were needed as the foundation. He was absent in Europe for fifteen months in 1856-57 busy with choosing and buying books for this institution. The debt which the city of Boston owes him is a great one: thanks to his care and energy, the Public Library already has become a most valuable aid to study, and perhaps the best library in the country, besides promising to be one of the few great ones of the world. During his lifetime Mr. Ticknor gave many valuable collections to the library, and in his will he left it his own unique Spanish library and a generous bequest for the further purchase of books. From the first he was quite as generous with his time and knowledge. The diary he kept during his last stay abroad is full of references to his interest in the library and to the constant attention he gave to its affairs. He returned to Boston in September, 1857. The remaining years of his life he spent at home, enjoying the company of his friends, corresponding with those abroad, and encouraging interest in letters in every way. He died in the full possession of his faculties, in his eightieth year, January 26, 1871.
The editors of these memoirs appear to have performed their task with great discretion and good taste. It has probably not been a difficult one, consisting mainly in selecting from abundant and well-ordered material, while suppressing what was too private or too trivial for publication. What they have had to say of Mr. Ticknor's character is expressed with a proper warmth of feeling, but without any extravagance of eulogy. His life, as they justly remark, was distinguished by "an unusual consistency in the framework of mind and character" and "an unusually steady development of certain elements and principles." What he from the first set himself to attain lay within the compass of his capacity as well as of his means and opportunities. Thus he had no external hinderances to contend against, and no inward misgivings to struggle with. No man, we imagine, was ever less troubled with self-dissatisfaction. He felt the limits of his faculties and qualities, if he felt them at all, only as useful and secure defences. Within them there was all the completeness that could be gained by persevering exercise and culture. There is not a page of his journals and letters that does not bear testimony to his earnest, careful and profitable study of men and books, while we doubt if a remark can be found in them that shows either sympathetic insight or subtle discrimination. His intellect had all its resources at command, but it had more of rigor than of vigor, more of formal precision in its methods than of well-directed force in its performances. Hence the semblance exceeded the reality, and it might have been said of him, as it was said of Guizot, "Il impose et il en impose." This biography of him makes, consequently, no appeal to the deeper feelings and awakens no train of higher thought. But it has an interest which, though of an ordinary kind, is scarcely surpassed in degree by that of any similar work; and it forms a worthy memorial of a man whose wide attainments, strict integrity and warm affections endeared him to his intimates and made him respected by all.
T.S. PERRY.